


Palladium Protocol

by anonemone



Series: Palladium Protocol [1]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), Iron Man - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Extremis, Gen, Not A Fix-It, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Tony Stark is Sir Not Appearing in This Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-15
Updated: 2016-09-05
Packaged: 2018-08-08 23:36:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 8,338
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7778062
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anonemone/pseuds/anonemone
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rhodey wakes up from the hospital groggy, annoyed, and paralyzed.</p><p>And then FRIDAY tells him that Tony Stark is dead.</p><p>Or, an AU in which Tony hadn't perfected the Mark XLVI yet, and had to go to Siberia without the additional miniaturized arc reactors.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Rhodey woke up to Rebecca Black’s singing.

Tony had chosen the ringtone for him in an obtuse reference to FRIDAY’s name. They agreed to the compromise when Tony gave him the phone—no direct link to FRIDAY, because Rhodey liked having even just the illusion of privacy, but FRIDAY basically had his number, and had free reign over his phone as long as Rhodey gave his consent. FRIDAY had never actually called him on her own before, though; it was always Tony (whose ringtone was, predictably and through no choice of Rhodey’s own, the Black Sabbath song).

Rhodey lay on his bed for a while, unmoving. He felt like utter shit. His mouth was dry, his head pounded, the whole world seemed just a little bit out of focus, probably because of painkillers, and, just like the doctor had told him would be his new normal, he couldn’t feel his legs.

The song does not stop.

Rhodey rolled his eyes and felt around for his phone, trying to keep his movements to a minimum, and accepted the call.

FRIDAY’s voice came out of the phone speakers, tinnier than what Rhodey was used to. “Boss, Tony Stark is dead.”

Rhodey sat up with a start, ignoring the jolt of pain which shot across his back and the erratic beeping of his heart monitor. _Tony Stark is dead._ FRIDAY went on about the suit’s biometrics readings and how its communications arrays were down, but Rhodey barely heard her. He knew he should pay attention, get more information, but he gets stuck on the words. _Tony Stark is dead._

The last time he had heard those words, it was from a superior, when Rhodey refused to let them downsize the team searching for Tony. _Get ahold of yourself, Lieutenant Colonel! It has been two months in the Afghan desert in the hands of terrorists. We’ve received no ransom_ _letter. Tony Stark is dead._

The last time he had heard those words, it was a lie brought on by exhaustion and desperation. Tony had been alive, and Rhodey had found him.

Rhodey fought to get his heartrate back down, relaxing his clenched fists and regulating his breathing; he couldn’t have the nurses rushing in to check on him. He couldn’t remove the monitor, either, not yet. He reached over to turn off his IV drip, though; he checked the bag while he was at it and yeah, painkillers. That was going to be a bitch later, he thought, as he carefully pulled the tube out of his hand. He applied pressure on it through the hospital blanket, watching as a spot of red spread out on the white of the sheets.

Rhodey considered his options. The War Machine armor didn’t have FRIDAY onboard. He piloted with good, old-fashioned (semi-)manual controls, and without the use of his legs, it would be impossible to control.

Anyway, his armor was probably still wrecked from the fall.

“Fry, if I get into an Iron Man suit, will you be able to move my legs for me?”

“With the injuries that you have—“

“Will you?” Rhodey interrupted.

“Yes, boss,” Friday said, mollified.

“Do it.”

“Yes, boss.”

“Can you override Tony’s security for me?”

“There are no need for an override. Your biometrics have access to all suits.”

That stopped Rhodey. “ _Why?_ ”

“I am following the Palladium Protocol, boss. In the case of Tony Stark’s death, control of all Iron Man armors and all related infrastructure passes to Colonel Rhodes, as do all Stark-owned Avengers facilities and all non-SI workshops and the contents within. As of the revision made two weeks ago, all Tony Stark’s SI shares also passes on to the Colonel.”

Realization dawned on Rhodey. ‘Palladium Protocol,’ after the element that was poisoning Tony all those years ago. He knew Tony wanted his tech in the hands of somebody he trusted in the case of his death, he couldn’t have gotten control of the Iron Man MkII otherwise, but he didn’t think that  _this_ was Tony’s plan.

Tony didn’t mean for him to be War Machine. He was supposed to be Iron Man.

Rhodey’s fury at the realization is an old, familiar thing. Tony did that a lot, plan things for people without telling them. Rhodey knew he meant well, and for the big things he trusted Tony’s judgement, but it still rankled. And, from the latest revision, which must have come after Tony and Pepper broke up, Tony didn’t just plan for Rhodey to replace him as Iron Man. No, he planned for Rhodey to replace him as _Tony Stark._

Rhodey had to shake his head at that to clear it. He was being a hypocrite, he knew; Tony didn’t _really_ want Rhodey to replace him. Soldiers always had their wills in order, _he_ had his will in order, and Tony is—well, not a soldier, but a superhero. Anyway, the SI shares would have probably reverted back to Pepper once Tony had some time to get over their breakup. No, Tony just wanted his legacy to be passed on to people he trusted.

Still, the thought of Tony constantly considering his death and planning for the past eight years to pass it all on to _Rhodey_ —

The sound of shattering glass distracted him from that train of thought. An Iron Man suit had come flying through the window and into the room. It seemed that FRIDAY, like her creator, had a flair for the dramatic.

The armor paused by his bedside, took a good look at him, and then disassembled.

Rhodey had the good sense to rip off the cords of the heart monitor before pieces of the suit came hurtling at him and started assembling. In hindsight, he realized that FRIDAY had probably hacked into the hospital’s systems so that no alarm would sound when he did so.

That wasn’t what he was thinking of then, however. Suddenly, he was back in the War Machine armor, his HUD dark and his suit unresponsive.

Abruptly, the assembly stopped. “Boss? Are you okay? I am detecting a rapid increase in both your heart and respiration rates.”

Suddenly, he was falling and falling and—

_Tony Stark is dead._

“I’m fine.”

He took a deep breath, and the faceplate locks itself into place.

***

Rhodey had barely been flying ten minutes when Pepper’s caller ID popped up on his HUD, interrupting the video feed FRIDAY was playing.

“Tony, what the hell do you think— _Rhodey_?”

It made sense. As far as anybody else knew, Iron Man had crashed into Columbia Medical and broken Rhodey out. Who else were they going to call but Pepper Potts?

“What—how— _why?_ You should be recovering! Your mother will be worried sick! She’s just about to fly in from Philly, you know. Your niece, too.”

Rhodey winced; they were going to kill him.

“Can you, maybe, stop them?” Pepper’s responding glare was enough to stop an army. “I have to do this, Pepper. Tony is—“ _dead—_ “incapacitated. Somewhere in Siberia. I can’t just—” Rhodey clenched his teeth and cleared his throat, pushing his emotions back in favor of the mission, like he was trained to do. He wasn’t allowed to freak out. No distractions. “Please, Pepper.”

“I have stopped reading any vitals from Tony 16 minutes and 47 seconds ago, Ms. Potts.  All attempts at establishing communications have also failed. I had to conclude that he is now dead,” FRIDAY but in.

The strangled sound Pepper made was heartbreaking, and Rhodey could only imagine what she must have been feeling. She broke up with Tony because she was tired of worrying, of being with a person who always put everyone and everything else before himself, and now this. She covered her mouth with her hand and looked at Rhodey with eyes full of horror and concern.

“I’ll find him, Pepper,” Rhodey said, trying to reassure her, but really he did not feel all that confident himself. If _FRIDAY_ concluded what she did, then odds were that—no. He had to believe that somewhere in FRIDAY’s algorithms, she has made a mistake. After all, Tony was one of the most resilient, resourceful, and brave people on the planet. Tony didn’t have access to JARVIS after the Mandarin attacked the Malibu mansion a few years ago, either, and everyone had thought he was dead, but he improvised and saved himself.

“Why was he there? Who did this?”

Rhodey thanked the heavens that FRIDAY did not respond for him. He wasn’t sure that Pepper knowing just then that Tony was there following Steve and Barnes was going to help. Besides, he didn’t have the whole story yet; Pepper’s call had cut off FRIDAY’s video playback of the events in Siberia just as they started talking to Zemo. Maybe he’ll get to Siberia and see Steve’s and Barnes’ corpses, too. But that was altogether too morbid, and Rhodey immediately clamped down on the mental image.

“I don’t know yet,” Rhodey said, instead.

“Is Vision with you?”

“No.”

“Why not? You don’t know what could be waiting. If it ki—” Pepper sucked in a ragged breath; she couldn’t say it either. _“—incapacitated_ Tony, it could be dangerous.”

“There was no time,” Rhodey lied. Even at Mach 4, the flight to Siberia was going to take nearly two hours, and FRIDAY could connect his comms to Vision at any time. When he tried to, though, immediately after leaving Columbia Medical, he couldn’t even get himself to say Vision’s _name_ , let alone actually talk to him. Of course Rhodey knew that what happened to him wasn’t the android’s fault, but even just the prospect of hearing Vision’s voice, knowing that he had a hand in what happened, well. Getting into the suit was bad enough. Even as he flew and talked to Pepper it still took most of his energy to focus on how he needed to save Tony, to not freak the fuck out about being in a flying metal coffin without a ‘chute over open sea— _oh God._

Rhodey had never thought that he would ever not love flying.

Pepper must have read his apprehension on his face, though, because she didn’t push, didn’t even suggest that she get hold of Vision herself. Instead, she said, shakily, “Take care, okay? And bring Tony home.”

“I will.”

Pepper nodded and steeled her eyes, and Rhodey knew that he was no longer talking to Pepper Potts, his friend of the past ten years, but to Ms. Potts, CEO of Stark Industries, a woman on a mission who Rhodey was eternally thankful was on his side. “I’ll take care of things on this end. I’ll keep this quiet for now and deal with everything else, including your family.”

“Thank you.”

“You owe me big for this one, Rhodes.”

Rhodey smiled as the call disconnected. He felt like a weight he didn’t even know he was carrying was lifted, which is a general effect of talking to Pepper.

Now to follow her instructions and bring Tony home.


	2. Chapter 2

The video feed cut off with Rogers slamming the shield down.

“With the reactor decommissioned,” FRIDAY said, “all communications with Tony except for biometrics, vitals, and tracking were cut, to preserve energy for the suit’s movements. I immediately sent a retrieval suit to the tracker location. And then six minutes and 37 seconds later, his vitals dropped. I contacted you immediately.”

Rhodey screamed his frustration in his armor. He had to remind himself that the reactor didn’t actually keep Tony alive anymore. It was something visceral in Rhodey’s gut, having associated Tony’s life with his arc reactor for so long. To disable it was unthinkable.

Then again, driving a vibranium disc down on the arc reactor strong enough to destroy it could do bad things to an old man’s ribcage.

 “Where’s the retrieval suit now?”

“Only 1031.89 nautical miles ahead of you, boss,” FRIDAY said, making one of the tracking dots on the map on the corner of Rhodey’s HUD flash a few times to catch his attention.

Rhodey wanted to rage at the _stupidity_ of it all. He respected Steve a lot more when he thought he was fighting because he was against the Accords. He may have been dangerously arrogant, but at least it was for an ideological cause he believed in. Hell, he even understood if Steve was fighting for Bucky, because God only knew that he would have done exactly the same if it had been Tony. But the fact that all of this was because Steve didn’t trust them enough to tell them that there was something fishy going on? They had the resources to stop the other Winter Soldiers _and_ to potentially get the UN onboard. They could have been flying to Siberia instead of fighting in Leipzig.

Did Steve really think that they would not have helped despite the Accords? In his nearly three decades in the military, Rhodey had gotten into a lot of hot water for ignoring orders in favor of doing what he thought was right, only saved mostly by the fact that he had the backing of their then biggest weapons supplier, and then by the fact that only he can pilot the War Machine armor. The Accords were about respecting nations’ sovereignty. They were about accountability and having structures in place in case shit went sideward. They were not about becoming the UN’s attack dog and taking their orders unquestioningly. If the UN told them to do something wrong, Rhodey knew that he would just… not follow. Tony wouldn’t, either; it was the entire reason he was in Siberia in the first place.

On the other hand, while Rhodey understood why Tony had reacted the way he did, he had played directly into Zemo’s hands. If he only had stomped down on his feelings for long enough to talk to Steve, maybe Rhodey would never had to wake up to news that he was—that he could be—

“I’m mad, too,” FRIDAY whispered, almost as if confiding a secret, as if she was sharing something precious. And she was. Even JARVIS had never acknowledged having feelings in such a direct way.

Rhodey felt his rage subside a little bit. It was a bit weird to feel proud of an AI for staying strong under stress, but he was. He had the irrational urge to pat FRIDAY and assure her that everything would be okay.

The truth was, though, he was relying on her much more than she was relying on him.

***

Soon, the extraction suit’s dot on the map overlapped the dot of Tony’s armor.

FRIDAY’s distressed voice came over the comms. “Boss, he’s not here.”

“Show me what you see,” Rhodey said, and his view of the sky was replaced with the view of cold Siberian bunker.

The suit was open, and empty.

“It’s completely depowered, boss. The reactor’s a wreck. He must have used the manual releases. But Tony wouldn’t get out of the suit in this cold, would he? Ambient temperature is -9 °C, and the undersuit is not designed for temperatures lower than 12 °C.”

Rhodey didn’t know how to answer that. Had he been in Tony’s position, he probably wouldn’t have left the armor, and would just have waited for FRIDAY’s extraction. Except Tony didn’t know that FRIDAY had been on her way.

“Getting any heat signatures?”

“No human ones in a two kilometer radius. Definitely nothing inside the base, boss.”

“Tracks?”

“None.”

The whole situation was eerily similar to that time the Mandarin had bombed the Malibu mansion and Tony had for some reason flown all the way to Tennessee. He was down an armor and an AI then, too. And he survived.

The difference was that he had been in civilization, with free access to tools.

“Are you sure he’s not in the base? Maybe there’s a workshop down there or something.”

“It’s more bunker than base. Blueprints from the SHIELD data dump show no workshops.” The video feed minimized to the left part of the screen, and drawings of the base took up the right side. “There’s nothing here, boss.”

Rhodey studied the blueprints, and of course FRIDAY is right.

“Boss, what do I do?” FRIDAY asked, sound so heartbreakingly lost.

“Keep guard on the armor. Wait for me.”

***

As soon as he touched down, Rhodey had the extra armor making progressively larger circles around the base, looking for heat signatures that did not belong to the local wildlife, or tracks, or radio chatter—anything.

Meanwhile, Rhodey scoured the base himself, and FRIDAY was right. There was nothing there. He could see signs of a fight everywhere, but it was all consistent with what he saw from the Tony’s feed.

He sent a bomb into the room with the five supersoldiers, just to be safe.  The suit wasn’t detecting any heartbeats or signs of life, but cryostasis was a strange thing.

And then he got to the armor, and the arm, and the shield. He examined the armor, but there was no sign that it was forced open. Tony must have gotten out himself, or told somebody how to do it.

“FRIDAY, do you think the suit would have kept recording after it lost power?”

FRIDAY highlighted the area of the memory banks, and ran some diagnostics. “The suit is programmed to do so, boss, even if communications were down, but it looks like the memory banks were also damaged in the fight.”

With FRIDAY’s help, he extracted the memory banks. Then, taking a few steps back, he vaporized the suit, too. He couldn’t risk it falling to the wrong hands, and he couldn’t really bring it back to the Compound.

It’s an ordeal, but eventually he got the shield and the arm strapped across his back. He held the memory banks, which was just around as big as a regular hard drive except with an exponentially larger capacity, in his right hand. That was going to make controlling the armor harder, with one less stabilizer, but he couldn’t risk dropping it and losing his only clue to Tony’s whereabouts.

He gripped the memory bank, careful not to crush it, and flew back to New York.

***

Rhodey left the contacting Pepper and explaining everything to Vision to FRIDAY. Instead he immediately locked himself down in the workshop and tried to salvage something from the suit’s memory arrays. It was sort of a dick move, but he just didn’t have the energy anymore. The extra armor was still in Siberia, looking, and FRIDAY was also monitoring satellite images and plane activity, but the search was looking more and more bleak. The memory arrays were the only clue they had left, if only he could get them to work.

He was at it for nearly two hours when the call from the UN came in. T’Challa had turned Zemo in.

He told FRIDAY to tell Vision to stay and guard the Compound, and then flew to Berlin as fast as he could.

If T’Challa brought Zemo in, it meant that he was there in Siberia. He must have gotten Tony out, too, as well as Steve and Barnes. He must have dropped them off in Wakanda, first, which was why he was so late in bringing Zemo in.

T’Challa must have saved Tony.

It was just getting dark in New York when he left, but the sun was already rising as he touched down on the rooftop of the JCTC. Everett Ross, who was already waiting there, greeted him and led him straight to one of the meeting rooms.

“Mr. Stark,” T’Challa stood and greeted as he walked in, giving no indication that he knew it wasn’t Tony in the armor, and Rhodey felt all the hope that he let himself feel on the way to Germany shatter. He was right back where he started, with fried memory arrays, a disembodied arm, a scratched shield, and no idea where to find Tony.  

Rhodey wasn’t sure who started the movement, him or FRIDAY.  He felt his legs move into a bracing stance and his arm raise up. The whir of repulsors charging up filled the room.

The woman sitting behind T’Challa stood up, chair clattering to the floor, ready to pounce. T’Challa extended his arm to hold her back, eyes not leaving Rhodey, but braces himself, too.

Everett Ross, who Rhodey had forgotten was even in the room, cleared his throat.

Rhodey let his arm fall and the energy reroute away from the repulsor. The rest of his body followed a too-long moment later, moving back into a more neutral position.

He can’t afford to burn this bridge now. He needed all the allies he could get.

“Your Highness,” he said, instead, bowing his head. Through the suit’s voice modulators, he sounded exactly like Tony would have.

T’Challa relaxed and nodded to his companion, who glared at Rhodey one last time before retreating and picking her chair up.

Ross looked around and seemed satisfied that the superheroes under his supervision weren’t going to try and murder each other. “Right, then,” he said, clapping his hands together. “Mr. Stark, I believe you have a testimony to give? About what _exactly_ happened in Siberia?”

Ross side-eyed T’Challa. His suspicion was palpable, but T’Challa, with all the grace of his position, simply ignored it.

“I’d like to talk to King T’Challa first,” Rhodey said.

“Very well,” Ross said, and clasped his hands behind his back.

One minute passed, and then two.

Rhodey turned his head to him and stared, but Ross stood his ground and just stared expectantly. It was evident he had no plans of leaving them alone, so Rhodey decided to change tactics. Too many bugs in the JCTC, anyway, and FRIDAY could only take them out for so long.

“I have to get back to Rhodey,” he said instead, throwing all subtlety to the wind.

T’Challa suppressed a smile.

“But—”

“I’ll give my testimony later. We’re not under time pressure, right?”

“We’d really rather—”

“Great,” Rhodey said, patting Ross’ shoulder. He did not miss his wince. “You know where to reach me.”

At a loss, Ross turned to T’Challa. “King T’Challa—”

“Would you like to ride my jet to New York? It shouldn’t take too much time.”

“Yes, thank you, Your Highness.”

“And then I must return to Wakanda.” Finally turning to Ross, T’Challa said, “You know how to reach me, too. Let us go, Okoye.”

Ross could only sputter and watch as the three of them left the room.

***

As soon as they get onto T’Challa’s jet and Okoye strapped into the pilot’s seat, Rhodey lifted his faceplate up.

“Colonel Rhodes.” T’Challa was clearly shocked for a moment, but he quickly schooled his features. Rhodey wanted to laugh; only recently, it was him who was shocked by the Panther’s surprise unmasking. “I greet you on your fast recovery.”

“I’m paralyzed from the waist down,” Rhodey said.

T’Challa blinked at him for a moment, eyes flicking down to Iron Man’s legs, and then wisely decided to not comment on it. “Where is Mr. Stark?”

“I don’t know. We found his armor in Siberia, but he was gone.”

T’Challa looked stricken at the news. “He did not come back from Siberia?”

Rhodey shook his head. “We’re still looking, but there’s no sign of him anywhere.”

T’Challa took a moment to mull over the news. “I’m sorry. I was there, too.” He looked intently at Rhodey, as if searching for something. And whatever it was, he seemed to find it. “I followed Mr. Stark to Siberia, knowing he would lead me to Barnes. I should not have left him behind.”

Rhodey sighed. No, he shouldn’t have, but what can be done now? “Just—don’t tell Barnes and Rogers.”

It was a shot in the dark, but T’Challa’s reaction told Rhodey everything he needed to know. “They’re in Wakanda right now, aren’t they?”

T’Challa’s eyes flicked towards Okoye for a moment; he looked guilty. Rhodey guessed that the Wakandans were not too happy about that. “It’s true, I am giving refuge to Barnes, because he was wrongfully accused and unfairly treated. He was a victim of Zemo’s plotting, as well as of HYDRA’s inhumanity for the past seventy years.

“But my protection does not extend to the Captain. My father spearheaded the Accords, I signed them, and he broke them. I have told him that he must leave the country before I returned from delivering Zemo.”

“I just don’t understand why you didn’t take Tony with you, too,” Rhodey said, sounding like a whining child. T’Challa hung his head low, and Rhodey shook his head. It was nobody’s fault, he reminded himself. Maybe if he repeated it enough he’d actually believe it.

“The Captain and Mr. Barnes told me he was fine, and I trusted that he had the means to get out. I thought—but it doesn’t matter what I thought. I will do my best to help find him, but I must admit that I cannot promise much. My country is in mourning, for my father, and there is much to be done.”

“I understand,” Rhodey said, because he did. T’Challa was the new king of a nation, and he had responsibilities. He tried to quell the bitterness threatening to overwhelm him; there was no use for it now. He was not very successful. “They took his arc reactor out. He had no backup power to fly, and his communications were cut.”

T’Challa looked outraged at that, which endeared him to Rhodey a little bit. “I was not aware. They didn’t tell me about this.”

“Back-up power must have kicked in, but that was never meant to last for too long.”

“The Captain will probably connect to the Black Widow from Wakanda while I am away. I can access the satellites logs and find out how to get in touch with her, if you’d like.”

Rhodey considered T’Challa’s offer. He had known Natasha since she went undercover at Stark Industries. They got along well enough then, but that was Natalie, not Natasha. When Natasha was exposed, she helped them during the mess in Stark Expo, and it was the beginning of a reliable, if a bit distant, friendship.

And then they became teammates, and Natasha became one of Rhodey’s closest friends. Rhodey respected her. She was probably the most skilled out of all of them; she knew what she was doing. She had a wicked sense of humor, too, and knew how to cut loose and have fun. She’s had his back for so many missions, and Rhodey trusted her, both on and off the field.

And yet—she let Barnes and Rogers get away.

“They’re going to break out the former Avengers from the RAFT, you realize.”

T’Challa nodded. “Will you stop them?”

Rhodey stayed silent, so T’Challa continued. “The RAFT is an American prison for American criminals. It is not the concern of Wakanda if they escape, as long as they keep out of our country.”

Rhodey wanted to agree. He could just look the other way, not respond when Secretary Ross called. That was what Tony would do. The RAFT wasn’t the UN’s; it was apparently Ross’ pet project, and Rhodey respected the General and his years of service, but something about that didn’t quite sit right with him.

But the team were still criminals who broke the Accords and caused millions in property damage, and the RAFT was one of the only places secure enough to hold them, and even then, only just. He didn’t trust that Rogers would keep out of any international business once he broke out, either. He’d just keep breaking international law to do what he thought was right or whatever. After all, that was how the whole mess started.

He decided to just deal with that when it happened. For now, he had to go find Tony.

“They’re not my priority, either.”

“And the Widow?”

“Yes,” Rhodey said, finally deciding. “Give me her number.”


	3. Chapter 3

The clock that FRIDAY had pulled up told him it that was nearly five in the morning. It’s easy to see how Tony had regularly gone on days-long engineering binges down here. In the artificially lighted, un-windowed workshop, time began to matter less than the project. And at that moment, his project was finding Tony.

Being out of the armor was a relief, even if it was a bit (a lot) less convenient. It hadn’t occurred to him to get a wheelchair from the Med Bay on his way down to the workshop, so he was confined to the desk for the most part. It was a good thing the bots and FRIDAY-controlled armors were around to hand him things.

“Boss, you have to rest. The memory banks are too damaged to be repaired.”

Rhodey knew that what FRIDAY was saying was true. He had stopped making progress hours before; it wasn’t really his field.

Tony could have fixed it.

Rhodey resisted the urge to throw the damn thing across the room. The suit’s memory banks were his only clue about what could have happened to Tony. Otherwise, he wouldn’t know where to start looking.

“Boss,” FRIDAY tried again, her voice gaining an edge, but Rhodey ignored her. He couldn’t just stop trying.

Suddenly, the lights dimmed, all the work he had open was minimized and replaced by a whole different set of displays.

“FRIDAY, what is this?”

“This is File 282. I think you should take a look at it, boss.”

Annoyed, but deciding to indulge FRIDAY, Rhodey looked around, trying to absorb all the information she was presenting him. There was a bunch of graphs and formulae, some flowcharts, what looked like code in a vaguely C-like language, and, in the middle of the room, directly in front of him, was a galaxy of holographic orange stars.

“So, what is it?”

“It’s a modified Extremis virus.”

Rhodey blinked. “Why are you showing this to me?”

“Its healing factor was limited due to its _explosive_ side-effects, but Tony had been trying to reengineer it to allow a direct cybernetic interface.”

Rhodey got what FRIDAY was trying to say: it would allow him to walk without having to rely on her as the middleman. “You’re saying I should use it.”

FRIDAY was silent for a beat. If Rhodey didn’t know better, he’d have thought that she was mulling over her answer.  “No. Not yet. There are still some flaws to fix. I’m telling you to take a look at it.”

He knew she just wanted to distract him from what he _really_ should be doing, even if she was couching it as something that would help him with his condition. Rhodey turned to one of her cameras, the one just to his right, and gave it his best unimpressed look. FRIDAY didn’t take the bait, though, and just turned the brightness of the holograms up even more.

He had her talk him through a lot of the information. It turned out that, while Tony had figured out how to stop the healing factor to remove it from Pepper, he didn’t just stop there. Just like FRIDAY said, Tony was working on a way to reprogram the Extremis nanites to allow a neural interface with electronic devices—he wanted to be one with the Iron Man suit.

In fact, it seemed that he had that part down already; the problem was that, without the original formula’s healing factor, the added strain it caused on the human system was not sustainable in the long run, and having only fragments of Maya Hansen’s research, Tony was stuck.

And certainly, he thought as he scanned through the files, so was Rhodey.

He played with the galaxy in front of him, enlarging it and rearranging components at random. It was surprisingly calming. “Is there any other research on this?”

“Not really. Dr. Hansen was the only one truly working on it, and I’m already displaying the little of her research that wasn’t hidden or destroyed by Killian.”

If the electronics of the memory banks were confusing, the contents of File 282 was completely foreign. If he—they—really wanted to pursue this, he had to call in somebody with more expertise. A couple of people sprang to mind.

Rhodey was mulling over whether he should contact them, still playing with the holographic galaxy, when FRIDAY interrupted him.

“Boss, Ms. Potts is requesting entry to the workshop.”

He quickly waved away all traces of File 282. “Let her in.”

Pepper walked in in all her crisp pantsuit and sky-high stiletto glory, looking unfairly immaculate at—Rhodey checked the clock which FRIDAY left up—5:47 in the morning. She probably dropped by on her way to the SI offices.

She looked around, taking in the mess in the room. FRIDAY had helpfully pulled up the screens he had been working on before she showed him File 282, so it was all schematics of the memory banks, a running report of the findings of the armor in Siberia (a whole lot of nothing, as it happened), and satellite imagery and air traffic around the area of the bunker. Pepper turned to Rhodey and pinned him with a look so disappointed that he wanted to retroactively declare a lab blackout and just have it so that she never entered in the first place. “ _Rhodey_.”

“Pepper.”

Despite herself, Pepper grinned at that, but she quickly covered it with a pursing of the lips. “Have you even slept?”

“I didn’t find Tony.”

Her gaze softened at that, the tension Rhodey didn’t even fully register was there leaving her shoulders. “Did you find out why he was in Siberia? FRIDAY wouldn’t tell me anything beyond the fact that you’re still searching.”

That was Rhodey’s instructions; if Pepper was to hear about what happened, it had to be from him.

Rhodey wanted to tell her. He wanted to tell her so bad, to unload all the anger and sadness and _helplessness_ he felt. He wanted to tell her about T’Challa’s irresponsibility, about Natasha’s betrayal, about Rogers’ sheer _nerve_ and hypocrisy and stupidity _._ He felt the rant bubble up; he just needed to open his mouth and all the ugliness inside would spill out and never stop, an endless deluge of feelings that he just didn’t want to, couldn’t, deal with right now.

He was just so, so tired.

He kept his mouth shut and shook his head.

Pepper looked away for a moment. Somebody who didn’t know her well might have thought that she was dismissing the situation, but Rhodey knew that in that brief moment, Pepper quickly broke down and then built herself back up. He could only hope to have her strength, he thought, as he felt another part of himself break. He should have just told her everything, but he just can’t. He had failed her, too.

“How long have you been down here?,” Pepper asked.

“A long time, Ms. Potts,” FRIDAY said, drawing out the o in long, and Rhodey cursed her for using her sass protocols in the most inopportune moments.

“ _Rhodey_.”

“How did the covering up go?”

Pepper narrowed her eyes at his deflection, but dropped it and just shrugged in answer. “Not too bad, actually. It’s not like anybody expected Tony around today.

“It’s a good thing you broke out of Columbia Medical the way you did, actually. We can tell people he’s by your bedside and refuses to leave, which is probably what he’d be doing anyway, if—.“ She cleared her throat. “I don’t know how long I’ll be able to keep it up, though. He’ll have to attend a board meeting sometime, and after that mess in Germany, people will expect public appearances.”

Rhodey thought it over, and Pepper was right. He would have to deal with the media at some point. And then there was the issue of Secretary Ross. Rhodey may have the JCTC and the UN fooled for now, but he knew that eventually Ross was going to call, and would probably expect a meeting.

It was a good thing Tony is known for not going to those.

“FRIDAY and I can pilot Iron Man around, make it look like he’s still out there.”

“Okay, but how about Tony Stark?”

“Well, Iron Man’s voice modulators make me sound just like him in the suit. For sound bites, FRIDAY can probably pull recordings from her files.”

“Yep, can do, boss,” FRIDAY confirmed.

“It won’t hold for too long,” Rhodey admitted, “but it will buy us time.”

Pepper looked dissatisfied, but she doesn’t push. “I guess that’s settled then.”

They were quiet for a moment, both making plans and back-up plans, cataloging everything that needed to be done and what it would take to do it.

It’s Pepper who speaks first. “I bought you some time, too, but you _will_ need to face your family sometime, you know. I’m as worried about Tony as you are, believe me, but you have to take care of yourself, too. You’re _injured_ , Rhodey. And don’t think I didn’t see your expression when I asked you why you were going to Siberia alone.”

He had another chance to tell her everything, to explain why he _can’t_ rest, _shouldn’t_ rest. “I know, I just—” And suddenly it was all too much again, everything he needed to say all trying to get out at the same time, resulting in nothing getting out in the end.

“Have you talked to Vision?”

Rhodey just stared at Pepper with what he was sure was guilt in his eyes.

Pepper sighed and smiled gently. “Just—remember that I’m here for you, okay? Lots of people are. Now go sleep.”

“Have _you_ slept?”

“Oh, you know, a couple of hours, the usual.” Pepper’s sigh this time was more dramatic. “Just par for the course for the CEO of the largest multinational tech company.”

There it was again, the way Pepper made everything seem so much lighter. For a moment, Rhodey forgot about Siberia, about the JCTC, about Extremis. “Yeah, I don’t know, being a superhero is pretty hard too, what with saving the world on the regular and all that.”

Pepper scoffed. “Okay, so you save the world, but do you change it? Thought not. Now up to your room, chop chop.”

“Yes, _mom,_ ” he said, earning a mock affronted gasp from Pepper.

Rhodey was just about to stand up and head to the elevator when he realized that he couldn’t do that anymore. He was stuck in his chair, helpless.

“Rhodey?”

“FRIDAY,” Rhodey managed to choke out, and again the legs of the Iron Man suit assembled around his.

“Rhodey?” a voice asked again, FRIDAY’s this time, and Rhodey reminded himself that if there was anybody he’d trust with this, it’d be her.

Still, he thought, he had got to get himself a wheelchair down there.

Pepper had moved closer and put her hand on his shoulder, and was looking at him as if waiting for him to break down, or scream, or explode. Rhodey just shook his head, so she backed off.

“I’m okay. Sorry.”

She looked at him dubiously, but didn’t say anything. Instead, she stood up and helped him get on his feet.  Together, they walked to the elevator and out the workshop.


	4. Chapter 4

Surprisingly, it wasn’t yet dark when Rhodey woke up.

“Morning, boss. It’s 3:24 in the afternoon, weather is okay, and you have a message.” FRIDAY displayed the time, a quick rundown of the day’s news, and a string of eight numbers—Natasha.

It was way too early for this.

Rhodey considered just going back to sleep. He had stayed up until morning, after all, and he was in recovery. Nobody would fault him if he just shut his eyes again and got a few more hours in.

But—

He had so many things to do, and at the same time no idea how to start doing them. Hell, no _way_ of doing them.

Well, there _was_ one thing he could do.

He didn’t bother sitting up; it seemed like too much effort for doing something that didn’t require it anyway. He called up a keyboard and sent the number a message.

_Pick up. No other ears. –WM_

He waited for a minute, examining the ceiling. He began counting the spots of dirt that he could find.

And then he called.

Surprisingly, she did pick up.

Reading Natasha when she didn’t want to be read was hard enough in person (although Rhodey liked to think that he had gotten marginally better at it in the six years they had known each other), but over the phone, with just her slightly distorted voice to go by, it was plain impossible.

“Rhodes,” she said, her tone completely neutral. “You called.”

She was waiting for him to show his hand. Any other time he wouldn’t have minded, because he really had trusted her, even after her whole spying job in Stark Industries. After her actions in Germany, though, he wasn’t quite sure where she stood anymore.

“I did,” he said, and Natasha just hummed in response. Playing hard was going to get him nowhere. She needed him to make the first move. He was the one who called, after all. “I need your help.”

He couldn’t tell if the split-second too long pause she took was a result of a bad connection, or just her deciding how to react. “Oh?”

Rhodey took a deep breath and made a decision. She was Tony’s friend, too, and he knew she valued her friends. It was her entire reason for signing the Accords, after all. Of all the Avengers, Rhodey thinks it was Natasha, and Tony, who really found family in the team. He knew she wouldn’t take the trust he’d give her lightly. She’d have his back on this.

“Tony’s missing.”

Her sharp intake of breath, barely audible through the phone, told Rhodey all he needed to know. She cared about Tony, and she’d do what she can to help find him, he was sure. If her attention was diverted from the Raft breakout she was probably planning with Rogers as they spoke, then all the better.

“What do you mean?”

“What has Rogers told you?”

“Enough.”

Rhodey kept quiet, hoping to get more from her than that. He knew he didn’t hold a candle to her in the realm of information extraction, and that she could easily evade if she wanted, but he did hope that his trust would be repaid in kind.

And it was, in Natasha’s own way. She sighed, and some semblance of emotion crept back into her voice. “I know about Siberia.”

Rhodey wondered how much Rogers would have told her. Did he tell her about the video? About Tony’s hands raising up to protect himself as the shield came down on his arc reactor?

Did he tell her about how he and Barnes walked away, leaving Tony helpless, injured, and alone in the middle of an abandoned HYDRA base?

“Well, Tony never came back. We’re looking, but there’s no sign of him in the vicinity. Or anywhere.”

“And how do you think I can help?”

Rhodey had been refusing to acknowledge it for the past 31 hours, but with Natasha asking upfront, there was no getting around it anymore. “It’s a HYDRA bunker, where they were in Siberia. Maybe you can get information.”

“You think HYDRA has Tony.” It was a statement, just like all her others, but it sounded, to Rhodey’s ears, upset.

“I don’t know.” Oh, who was he kidding? There were no dirty spots on the ceiling; it was immaculate. “I don’t know if I want to think he is or not.”

“Because you have no other leads.” Natasha paused, and Rhodey liked to imagine that she was rubbing her temples with her free hand, like he’s seen her do a few times before. “I’ll see what I can find out. You’ll be the first to know, I promise.”

“Thank you.” He paused. “Oh, and don’t tell anybody else.”

“I’d have thought you’d want to torture Steve with the knowledge of what he’s done.”

She was teasing, now. Well, Rhodey thought she was. He wasn’t sure he liked it. “ _Natasha_.”

“Of course. Nobody else will know. You have my word.”

Rhodey almost asked how much that really meant, but that also just seemed the worst move he can possibly make at the moment, so he bit it back. Instead, he let the silence stretch on.

“You won’t stop us?” she asked.

God, there was that question again. Would he actively keep the team on the Raft? He hadn’t seen their conditions firsthand, but from what FRIDAY had relayed, they weren’t exactly five-star hotel material.

It also occurred to him that he may not exactly be the most physically able to stop the breakout of four superheroes, at the moment.

“Not my priority,” he said, truthfully, just like he had said to King T’Challa.

Natasha seemed satisfied enough with that. “I’ll be in touch.”

And then the call cut off.

Rhodey stared up at the ceiling. One call down. Two more he could make, if he wanted.

Extremis. What was he going to do about Extremis?

It would certainly make his life easier.

“Fry, bring up File 282.”

With a few hours of sleep behind him, Rhodey was able to digest more the file than he had the night (or early morning) before. A direct cybernetic interface, sustainable by the body only for a couple of months before the entire system collapses, resulting in organ failure and then death.

But. It would be more than just walking again. It would be a direct link to all satellite networks, to the entire internet, to all FRIDAY’s storage and processing power.

A couple of months.

Well, he was sure Suzi and Helen could figure it out in that time.

“Are the injections ready?”

“What? Boss—”

“Are they ready?”

“Boss, you can’t, it’s unstable, it wouldn’t last long, it’s too _dangerous_ —”

“Suit me up.”

She refused; no armor came hurtling through the door of his room. “Boss, what are you planning—”

He grabbed the side of the bed and used it as leverage to roll himself off. He braced his fall with his forearms, but his legs were still on the bed.

“I can lock you in,” she said, an edge of panic to her voice.

“I can shut you down,” he said, before realizing himself. He didn’t really mean that; he would never. “I’m sorry. I wouldn’t.”

He pulled himself forward a little, and his legs hit the floor with a slap.

“Boss.”

“I have to do this, Fry. I’ll figure it out before it’s too late, I promise.”

“No, you don’t have to, not yet. You have _time_.”

Except did he, really? Already 31 hours have passed, and who knew where Tony could be, what he was going through? And with only him and Vision left on the team, if anything happened in the near future, nobody would be around to handle it.

“Send a copy of everything to Helen Cho and Suzi Endo. They’ll deliver.”

“Then you can _wait_ , boss—”

He started dragging himself in a bastardized army crawl toward the door. He wasn’t actually sure what he planned to do, but if he had to drag himself to the workshop like this, he would do it.

“Boss—”

Finally caving in, FRIDAY sent an armor in and suited Rhodey up.

Through the helmet, FRIDAY’s voice was nearer, more intimate. “Boss, you can’t do this.”

“There are many things I can’t do, right now,” Rhodey said. “I’ll do this whatever happens, you know. I’ll find a way.”

“Showing you that file was a mistake,” FRIDAY said, petulantly. Good. She was relenting.

Rhodeylay on the floor in the armor for a while, catching his breath. “We okay?”

FRIDAY didn’t answer.

“Now let’s go to the workshop.”

The suit didn’t respond immediately like it usually did, and for a second Rhodey was afraid that FRIDAY was making good on her threat to stop him.

And then they stood up and started walking.

***

The first thing Rhodey registers when he wakes up is the pain shooting up and down his legs.

It isn’t sensation, not really, and his legs still don’t respond to his commands for them to move, but there’s pain where there was previously absolutely nothing. The residual healing factor of the new formulation probably did some minor repairs on his severed spinal cord—not enough to fully fix it, but enough for ghosts of sensation to come back.

The second thing he registers is—

_Boss. How are you feeling?_

He almost laughs, because she knows, and he knows she knows.

FRIDAY’s voice is different. FRIDAY’s _presence_ is different. It was hard to explain, to qualify, but of course everything has, fundamentally, changed.

Everything seemed so _slow_ , now. Or, not slow; that implied that it was causing him impatience, and it wasn’t. But Rhodey can feel his brain—their brain—function at speeds exponentially faster than it did before. It’s broader, too—he can tap so many things at once. Already in the background he is going through all the files in the SHIELD/HYDRA data dump, in addition to monitoring the different parts of the compound, as well as tracking down where Natasha is.

And, huh. It seems forgetting things isn’t a thing anymore.

Tony had once told him that he can hold up to six trains of thought at one time. He believed it, of course, because Tony is Tony, and back then he wondered how he can survive with such a constantly noisy brain.

Well, he knows now. Except it’s not so much noise as—as muffled static, in the background, the different frequencies of which he can bring to focus when he needed to.

 _How are you feeling_ , FRIDAY had asked, in what he would have previously thought was just moments ago, but now seemed to stretch on.

_Hey, FRIDAY. I’m feeling just fine._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'll be honest, this is a really self-indulgent fic, because I knew probably nobody would write Extremis!Rhodey, and I wanted it, so I wrote it. 
> 
> This is now part of a series, for POV reasons.


End file.
